Why is Thanksgiving so underrated?

By Becca Brandel

Opinion Contributor

The end of the Halloween season each year quickly ushers in the Christmas season, with trees, wreaths, and cookies popping up in stores even before October 31. Thanksgiving is given virtually no regard. No company makes Thanksgiving-themed commercials or enough Thanksgiving decorations to fill up the front end of Wegmans. The only way a commercial references Thanksgiving is for Black Friday deals that force people who want to get a good deal out of their dinners on Thanksgiving and into stores to spend the night. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy getting a deal on Christmas gifts as much as the next person, but when putting in perspective the meal and festivities you are cutting short just to get a laptop cheaper, does it still seem as worth it?

Thanksgiving has virtually become a holiday similar to Sweetest Day – a few cards or decorations go up here and there, but it’s not generally talked about or anticipated. The majority of families still celebrate some form of the holiday, but in the sense that society as a whole has completely moved on from the idea. Thanksgiving and Christmas both take place close to the end of their respective months, so there is certainly enough time for the excitement and advertising to build up for each, right? That certainly seems the case for Halloween, as the entire month of October is about it.

It is common knowledge at this point that the origins of Thanksgiving are certainly not as picture-perfect as we were initially taught in elementary school when we dressed up as Pilgrims and Native Americans and acted out skits about the two groups peacefully dining together. However, Thanksgiving is honestly not really about the mythological history that it is known for, but is a day specifically dedicated to seeing family, both close and extended, and getting together for a meal.

The minute the clock struck 12:00a.m. on November 1, Twitter was already eagerly shouting out the current countdown until Christmas and Star 102.5 just recently started playing Christmas music 24/7, contrary to their promise in previous years not to begin playing Christmas music until the day after Thanksgiving.

Christmas is brought in more than a month early purely because it is probably the easiest holiday to make the most money from. Weather you practice a faith or not, the bottom line is Christmas too is largely about a spending time with family and exchanging gifts with friends and family. Commercialization has changed the way we once viewed holidays, making them less about the people we spend them with and more about the things we buy to prepare for them, or how soon we begin preparing for them. It is more than easy to get caught up in this, but ultimately all this mentality does is rush us through another two months of our lives waiting for the next best thing, just for Christmas to end and for us to start counting down to a corporation’s next big money-maker. I’ve typically found that rushing things doesn’t tend to make them come any faster, so why not slow down and take each day for what it is: a day more than a month away from Christmas Day?